Rajiv Gauba is new home secretary after Rajiv Mehrishi; 16 other bureaucrats appointed

New Delhi: Urban development secretary Rajiv Gauba was on Wednesday named as the next home secretary to succeed Rajiv Mehrishi, who completes his term on 30 August.

File image of Rajiv Gauba. Twitter@Secretary_MoUD

Besides him, 16 new secretaries have been appointed to various central government departments as part of a major top-level bureaucratic reshuffle effected on Wednesday.

Gauba, a 1982 batch IAS officer of the Jharkhand cadre, will take over as the Officer on Special Duty (OSD) in the Union home ministry with immediate effect, an order issued by Department of Personnel and Training (DOPT) said.

He will take over as the home secretary from 31 August, it said.

Gauba has served in the home ministry as the joint and additional secretary where he looked after the crucial Naxal division.

Durga Shanker Mishra will replace Gauba as the urban development secretary. He is now the additional secretary in the same ministry.

Culture secretary NK Sinha will be the new information and broadcasting secretary in place of Ajay Mittal, who has been moved as DOPT secretary. DOPT secretary BP Sharma retires this month-end.

Senior bureaucrat Subhash C Garg, executive director in the World Bank, will be the new secretary in Department of Economic Affairs, a post that had fallen vacant after the retirement of Shaktikanta Das.

Aruna Sundararajan will be the new telecom secretary. She is at present the Secretary, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology.

NHAI chief Yudhvir Singh Malik has been appointed the Road, Transport and Highways secretary.